


Build your walls then break them away

by chaosandmemory



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst, Bottom Bucky Barnes, Dubious Consent, Dubious Science, Fuck Or Die, M/M, Restraint, Sex Pollen, Top Steve Rogers, minor bdsm, original scientist character - Freeform, wanton destruction of clothes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-09
Updated: 2018-04-09
Packaged: 2019-04-20 15:02:32
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,604
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14263617
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chaosandmemory/pseuds/chaosandmemory
Summary: Bucky and Steve have been on the verge of moving from friends to lovers for months. When Steve is infected by a virus that will kill him if he doesn't have sex, Bucky will save him at any cost.





	Build your walls then break them away

Bucky rests his hands on the glass, sniper still. Waiting to take a shot between breaths, but there's no shot to take, no hostile to eliminate. Only Steve, dwarfing the bed he's stretched out on, frowning at the ceiling. Trapped in a twelve by twelve cell with a bolted bed and a window that can be darkened to a mirror at any time. A sleek and high tech cell.

Bucky sucks in a lungful of air and releases it slowly.

Quarantine, not a cell. Steve is in quarantine.

Not imprisoned. Not being tortured. Just isolated until the science support team figures out what the hell was in the gas that Steve got dosed with and whether it will kill him like it killed the civilians who had been at ground zero.

The plates in Bucky's arm shift and settle and shift again.

The hum behind him is science babble: Autopsy and blood results and chemical composition and body function and conference calls to Wakanda and— His fingers dig into the window, metal scraping against the glass.

Steve is safe, not in need of rescue. Not imprisoned, not an asset, not an experiment.

Well. Steve is an experimental subject, for the foreseeable future.

Bucky forces himself to stillness again, but the plates of his arm don't settle.

"Steve, you dumbass," Bucky mutters, closing his eyes and concentrating on his breathing until his muscles relax and the constant recalibration of his arm eases. "I take my eyes off of you for one second and look at all the trouble you get into."

Bucky tenses as one of the scientists, clad head to foot in protective gear, enters the cell for the hourly blood draw. Steve doesn't so much as tense as come to attention. Dr. García keeps up a comforting patter as he takes blood samples and Steve responds by rote, sitting on the bed and watching him through slightly narrowed eyes with the same predatory expression that he's been giving everyone that comes in the room.

At the curling of Steve's fingers and the slightest lowering of his chin Buck snaps, "Get García out of there now." Out of the corner of his eye, Bucky can see the horde of scientists turn and stare. Last time, García was in there four times as long before Bucky gave them the signal to pull him. "Now," Bucky repeats louder, then flicks on the intercom.

"Hey, Steve."

Steve's chin comes up and he turns towards the window. He mouths Bucky's name, then his eyes widen and his gaze flicks to the door closing behind García. He shakes his head, breath catching in his throat, and his fists clench.

"I— shit." He stares at the door, stricken, then drops his eyes to the floor shoulders slumping forward.

Outright sympathy will either get Bucky's head bitten off or let Steve give in to the self loathing that he's always been prone to. Instead he rolls his eyes and murmurs, "Not being in control of your actions sucks, doesn't it."

Steve bites off a laugh, still staring at the floor. "That's one way to put it."

"You ever think we should get out of the superhero business, pal?"

Steve presses his palms against his face, shoulders lifting and dropping as he sighs. "Someone needs to do it."

Not you, not anymore, Bucky thinks, but saying it out loud is asking for an argument that he doesn't have the patience to navigate right now. "Sit tight. Geeks are working hard to reverse this shit."

Steve doesn't make a smart comment. He doesn't look up, doesn't take his face out of his hands. He just nods and hunches forwards a little more.

Bucky's stomach lurches as he stares at Steve, willing sense into his hard head and health into his body for the millionth time since he followed the sounds of a towheaded kid getting beat and refusing to stay down. The former has never took, but the latter still has a chance.

Better have a chance.

The arm whirs again, plates aligning and strengthening. Bucky pushes away from the glass before he punches through it.

***

Hours later, after whispered consultations and a few too many four letter words for Bucky's blood pressure, one of the scientists peels off from the horde and edges closer to his lurking place in the corner of the room. Bucky generally likes Dr. Anika Patil. His conditioned hatred to scientists is bypassed by her spiky explosion of blue streaked black hair and bright patterns she favors instead lab coats. Her patient willingness to explain what she is doing and why to the point of rambling also makes her a favorite.

Generally, Steve's life isn't on the line.

"We have a counteragent that should neutralize the virus, but…" Anika trails off, her lips pressing together as she shakes her head.

"But?" Shaking answers out of scientists will not be productive, he reminds himself. Shaking scientists that are almost friends will be even less so.

"Okay, here's the deal." She shakes her head again and rubs her forehead as if trying to ward off a headache. "All the men sustained erections, maintained after death. Hormonal response consistent with high levels of sexual arousal was found in blood samples of the women as well as the men. Given the results from the autopsies, we think side effects from the intensity of this arousal killed them."

"So you need to make the response go away?"

"Actually." She looks uncomfortable. "Our models show he needs to bring the act to completion."

"The what now?" Bucky glances at Steve, in the well lit, highly monitored room they have him in. Designed for claustrophobia and performance anxiety. "So give him some privacy, maybe a dirty magazine…"

"It's not that simple. We've run simulations up, down and sideways, and we think—" she clears her throat, a blush darkening the tops of her cheekbones, "—we think that he needs to have sex with someone else for this to work. Someone who has been treated with the counteragent.

"What?" His brain stalls momentarily at the ludicrousness of what she is proposing. He stares at her—or maybe glares, given the way she flinches. She never flinches from him, not in all the years he has known her, so he closes his eyes and takes a deep breath and grabs at the shreds of his self control. "Why the fuck—nevermind, don't care. Sex by what parameters?" Mission parameters, echos in his head. He was already forming the sketchy outline of a plan, but— "Handjobs? Oral? Vaginal? Anal?"

"Penetration of some sort, with him as the penetrating partner; hands don't have the mucous membranes that are needed for transmission. Oral is chancy, given the makeup of saliva. Vaginal or anal penetration will be he best choice. Which means unprotected sex will be a necessity, or this won't work. But if our models are correct, the receiving partner can be either female or—" she glances up at him, "or male."

"But no matter the sex of his partner, his control is thin and dropping by the minute." Bucky's smile at her incomprehension is bitter. Support teams that work with the good guys rarely have need to think outside the box about the inherent risks of dealing with enhanced humans. "He's a super soldier. Base model humans get damaged real easy, and when you're as out of your head as he's becoming, it's easy to do things you don't mean to." He scrubs his hands over his face. "If he hurts anyone while you're trying to save him…"

Bucky doesn't want to think of Steve crushed under that guilt. And even if Steve doesn't hurt anyone, the what ifs and was someone pressured to helps will eat his brain.

And whether Steve can say no at this point is as going to eat Bucky's.

"That just adds to the problem, then." Anika digs her fingers into her hair. "We don't know if there might be… transfer of whatever affected Captain Rogers. Although we think the counteragent should counteract it, whoever comes into contact with him could become infected." She closes her eyes. "If we had more time to study this, to experiment, we might come up with another solution."

"But you don't."

"Right now?" She opens her eyes and scowls. "This is the best we got."

Bucky shakes his head and laughs. He and Steve have been on the edge of tumbling from friendship to something more for months now, neither quite willing to take the final step but dancing closer every day. Steve refuses to push, and Bucky… some days Bucky feels like he's still relearning what it is to be human. Friendship is hard enough without bringing sex into the mix.

Bucky wants, though. He's always wanted, from the first time Bucky knew what it was to want someone that way. And not just a few sweaty minutes between the sheets, but everything.

Now it looks like the universe is going to push the issue.

***

Breaking the news to Steve goes about how Bucky expects.

His expression, as he listens, is blank to anyone who doesn't know him, shades of stubbornness and resignation to anyone who does. It's the face Steve wore every winter when whatever had him confined to the bed dug in claws and teeth: Steve Rogers fighting tooth and nail while staring death in the face.

And still refusing to inconvenience anyone on his behalf.

"I can't ask anyone to risk themselves," he says in his resolute Captain America giving inspiring proclamations to the troops voice. "I'm not that bad yet; I can hold out until you find another way."

His temperature has risen two more degrees, just under the threshold of cellular damage even for a supersoldier, the sweat sheening his skin is running down his skin in rivulets, and wetness grows from the tent in his pants that has not gone down for hours. Bucky does not snort, but does roll his eyes. Calling Steve on his bullshit will just make him dig in his heels, though.

As soon as the intercom is off, Bucky turns to Anika, angling himself so Steve cannot read his lips. "I'm going in."

Concern twists her lips into a frown. "Sergent Barnes—Bucky. We can't ask you to put yourself in that position unless—"

"You aren't asking. I'm telling you how it's going to go."

"We do have other volunteers…" She trails off, not quite meeting his eyes.

"You trying to save him or break him?" he snaps, then fists his hands, reaching for cool logic instead of hot emotion. "I got the same shit running through my blood as him, so I have the best chance making it out unscathed. Right now the best option is me or… me." Right now the only option is him, or he considers shooting anyone else who would take advantage of Steve like this.

"All right." She blows a breath out. "Okay. Fortunately we calibrated the counteragent to your metabolism."

Bucky glances up sharply; Anika responds with a shrug and a ghost of tired smirk. Maybe he and Steve haven't been as quiet about what they feel for each other as they thought.

"In a normal human, the counteragent would stay active for at least twelve hours. In you? Even at the dose we're giving you, you have a window of an hour, at most. Probably less."

"No taking him out to dinner first, got it."

"You'll need water-based lubricant. It's less likely to interfere with—"

"Right," Bucky said hastily.

"We'll let the A.I. monitor as much as possible, give you as much privacy as we can under the circumstances."

"Got it. Fine. Do we have time for this shit?"

She sighs and shakes her head. "Give us twenty minutes to get ready."

***

Bucky puts the time to good use, taking some alone time in the bathroom with his fist, his fingers, and a lot of lube. After, he changes into scrubs similar to those that Steve is wearing, loose enough to preserve at least some of his modesty, and packs a bag with everything he thinks he might need during and after. Finally, he secures his hair in a bun so it won't get in his way.

Anika either draws the short straw to inject the supersoldier with a known aversion to medical procedures or she volunteered. Knowing her, she probably volunteered. The only other scientist still in the room refuses to meet his eyes, although she looks sympathetic. Bucky suspects the reduced hoard of scientists is to give them some illusion of privacy, as if the monitoring Steve's room is under can't be done from half a city away.

He ignores the needle as it pierces his hip, heading for Steve before the sting has faded.

In the airlock, Bucky takes a deep breath and blows it out slowly. He's about to be locked in a cage that he can't easily break out of, under 24/7 surveillance. If he'd had an exhibitionist kink, it was long ago burned out of him. Now the thought of being watched sends a resigned roil of frustration tightening his chest and aching between his shoulder blades.

But for Steve? Anything.

He resolutely slips inside the room.

Steve's head snaps up immediately. "Bucky—" Fear and anguish are clear in Steve's eyes. Bucky's heart aches for him. "Get out of here."

"Nope." Bucky tosses the lube on the bed and his bag into the corner opposite the door. He continues to the middle of the room and braces himself, just in case Steve tries to throw him out. Steve stinks of sweat and sex, and the scent goes straight to Bucky's groin. Steve heaves deep breaths, twitching forward, then forcing himself back. His nose wrinkles, and Bucky wonders how sensitive his sense of smell is, and whether whatever he's influenced by has expanded it. Bucky has never let himself wonder if Steve can smell him as well as he can smell Steve, wasn't sure if he wanted to know.

Now he wants to know everything.

"I can't let you do this," Steve murmurs, but his eyes have grown hot, scanning up and down Bucky's body, lingering on the tent that the loose pants don't quite hide.

"Let?" Bucky raises an eyebrow, unimpressed. "You do don't get to make that choice for me."

"You shouldn't have to…" Steve shakes his head and clenches his fist. A shudder goes through him and he begins pacing around Bucky.

The answer to the unfinished statement is complex. Bucky watches Steve stalk and takes his time choosing which parts to share. Of course Bucky has to do this; Steve will probably die otherwise. But it's not the only reason. Maybe not the most important reason. "I want this. And if it's a choice between getting it the first time when you're dosed up and then again and again again when you're back in control, and never getting it at all…"

"I don't want to hurt you." While Steve's voice is plaintive, his body language is predatory; he has drifted closer again, this time close enough to touch. Bucky whirls and shoves Steve back against the wall, grabbing his wrists, twisting his arms above his head, and pinning them there with his left hand. His right hand closes around Steve's throat with just enough pressure to show he's serious. Steve surges up but Bucky doesn't let go, pressing forward until his forehead touches Steve's. Steve's chest heaves, his breath ghosting against Bucky's face, and his pupils dilate until black nearly swallows the blue.

"I can take whatever you dish out," Bucky murmurs. "And I won't let you do anything to me that I don't want." He doesn't close the distance, just waits and watches. The conflict plays out across Steve's face even as Bucky feels the tensing of the muscles pressed up against him as Steve consciously or unconsciously tries to get closer.

"Bucky—" The plea vibrates against the hand that still rests on Steve's throat, and Bucky can't help stroking his thumb against the soft skin under his jaw.

"Whenever I got my head out of my ass, would we have ended up here?"

"I'd had in mind the wrestling be a little less heavy on the bondage for the first date." Steve smiles suddenly, expression wistful. "But I'd really hoped so."

Even being half out of his head can't hide Steve's tells; he's never been able to lie spontaneously worth a damn. A knot of tension in Bucky's chest unwinds. He can work with this. "I'd rather rush things along than lose the chance to ever get anywhere." He leans forward until his lips brush against Steve's when he murmurs, "My choice," then closes the distance.

Steve whines, his mouth pressing up into the kiss. His body arches into Bucky's, dick hard against his belly. "Yes, god yes," he gasps into Bucky's mouth. "Please."

Steve begging sends electricity down his spine. Metal hand still locked around Steve's wrists, Bucky presses forward pinning Steve against the wall with his whole body. Steve's body burns hot against his. Bucky strokes the bristle at Steve's jaw, angling his head to take the kiss deeper, then pulls back enough to nip at his lips and down his jaw. Steve's head thumps against the wall, his breathing harsh and his dick twitching.

The jump of Steve's dick reminds Bucky slow isn't an option. And if he climbs Steve like he wants to, he'll lose the leverage to control him; Steve's tall enough now that Bucky can't make this work against a wall. Later, he promises himself, as he manhandles Steve over to the bed. Bucky pushes him down on his back and pauses, kneeling between his legs. He wants to look, but also—

As he expected, Steve surges up, grabbing for Bucky's wrists and wrapping legs around his waist. Bucky lets him, unmoving, watching Steve's eyes. Steve holds on for a heartbeat, fingers digging in to Bucky's wrists, before letting go and dropping back down, bouncing on the bed. He crosses his wrists over his head, tilting his head back to bare his throat. "Keep me pinned. You gotta make sure…" He swallows.

"I got you." Bucky leans forward, taking Steve's wrists in his hand again and locking it in place, the metal plates of his arm shifting to brace in the new position. Steve flexes his fingers and tests Bucky's grip, his shoulders relaxing, and he nods at Bucky. Bucky smirks back. "I won't let go again. Not even if you beg."

"I can do this all day." Steve's laugh is more than half moan. He ruts up against Bucky's stomach, arching up to press as much of his body against Bucky as he can.  
  
"Hope you don't like that shirt." With narrowed eyes Bucky reaches out and grabs the top of the shirt and yanks. Cloth gives, baring sweat-sheened skin stretched tight over flexing muscle.

"Hospital scrub white isn't really my color anyway."

"Then you won't mind if I do away with these, too." Bucky shifts to Steve's side, knees pressing on the side of Steve's chest, and grabs the waistband of the pants. Steve swings his head to watch, and his body follows, curling as close to Bucky as he can get. With a rip, Bucky tears the pants away, leaving shreds under Steve's hip and catching on his knees.

"Look at you," he murmurs reverently. He's seen Steve naked before; between living together in a shoebox of an apartment and serving together in the Commandos, that's a given. He's never seen Steve in this context, when the skin bared is all for him. He wants to bite every inch of skin. He wants to trace every muscle and every vein with his fingers, to press kisses to every scar.

He skims his hand down Steve's chest and lays his palm against his stomach, drags it down along the trail of hair leading to the tip of Steve's dick. He swipes his thumb through the wetness at the slit, traces a damp line underneath to the root, then circles each of his balls to press his thumb right behind.

Steve, almost unnaturally still from the moment Bucky put his palm to his skin, jerks forward with a hoarse cry, humping Bucky's hip. "I wanna feel— you're wearing—"

"Right. Yeah. I got—" No time. Bucky has no time to draw this out. He sucks in a breath and fumbles for the bottle of lube. He strips with the same efficiency with which he stripped Steve, tossing the shreds of his shirt behind him and kicking the shreds of his pants to the floor. Pushing Steve onto his back, he swings a leg over and straddles Steve's hips. As he leans down for a kiss, he grinds down, his dick against Steve's stomach, Steve's dick against the crease of his ass, and swallows Steve's moan with his own.

He snaps open the bottle of lube as he breaks the kiss—nearly snaps the bottle, in his haste—and reaches underneath to squeeze lube somewhere in the direction of Steve's dick. Enough to hastily slick him up, Steve's hips continuously jerking up as he thrusts into Bucky's hand.

Bucky lowers himself, knees clenched against Steve's sides as he nudges the head against his hole. Even with the prep—a lifetime ago, it seems—entry is a burning stretch. Steve groans like he's been punched, eyes screwing closed as Bucky sinks down, taking him all the way in one long slide.

Bucky waits, relaxing into the fullness hitting nerve endings that he didn't know existed, until Steve opens his eyes. Without breaking eye contact, he lifts his hips up, until Steve has almost slipped out, then down again tortuously slowly, every inch sparking a chain reaction through his entire body.

"Oh, fuck," Steve gasps. His hips snap up, and Bucky whines at the explosion of sensation. Steve stares up at Bucky, eyes wide, amazed, and then plants his feet on the bed and uses what leverage he has to set a pounding rhythm as he thrusts up into Bucky. Bucky leans forward for a messy kiss, and with the angle change it's even better. He clings tight with his knees, hands grasped around Steve's wrists, and holds on for the ride.

Orgasm takes Bucky by surprise, slamming through him as his dick jerks and spills on Steve's stomach. Steve follows, his thrusts growing ragged as he twists his arms to grab onto Bucky's hands. Bucky drops his full weight onto Steve and pants into his throat, shivering through the aftershocks.

Steve's erection has barely flagged inside him; Bucky is more than half hard already. Bucky arches, shuddering as Steve's dick hits all the right places. He tilts his head and smirks down at Steve.

"Bizarre gas or supersoldier refractory period?" he asks, arching again. This time he angles to get more friction on his own dick as well.

"Could ask you the same thing," Steve says, tilting his head to watch raptly where Bucky is rubbing against him, then lifts ts his head up up to lick the sweat from Bucky's collarbone and mouth kisses up his throat. "Could go another round or three, if you think you can keep up."

"Been chasing after you half my life. You ain't managed to lose me yet." Bucky leans down for a kiss and loses himself in the rhythm of Steve's hips.

***

Bucky is comfortably warm; that's the first thing he notices when he wakes. The arms around him aren't restraining him, and the scent of Steve surrounds him. The same Steve that has one ankle wedged between both of his and is sleepily nuzzling his throat. Bucky is sweaty and sticky and there are substances he doesn't want to think about crunching on his skin as he shifts, but Steve is in his arms. In his arms and alive, body temperature back down to baseline.

Bucky stretches. He's stiff, the good ache of muscles well used. His hair, which came undone somewhere around the third or fourth round, is a tangled mess. He hasn't felt this content in years.

Steve murmurs unhappily when Bucky moves, and blinks his eyes open with a sigh. He pulls far enough away to meet Bucky's eyes, then withdraws further, staring at a spot just over Bucky's shoulder, crease between his eyebrows deepening. "Wish you didn't have to come in here and…" He shrugs, color high on his cheekbones.

Bucky's breath catches and he shifts up onto his elbow, peering down at Steve through the curtain of hair. "Steve," he forces out. "Just, please. Tell me you would have wanted it without—" Bucky can't finish the thought. Did he misjudge the situation? Did he want it so much, he saw something that wasn't there?

"I've wanted you since 1936, hasn't changed in the last eighty years," Steve mutters, jaw set.

Bucky blows out a sigh of relief. "Don't fucking scare me like that." He collapses back down, his heart still going double time, and grins up at Steve. Who of course was more worried about hurting him than his own survival. The idiot. He pokes his idiot on the chest. "I'd've put out on the first date, y'know."

Steve finally meets Bucky's eyes, relaxing back against Bucky. "Just don't like the thought that I pushed you faster than you were comfortable." He combs fingers through Bucky's hair and traces a thumb over his eyebrow. "Didn't think you were ready."

"Didn't think you deserved to put up with any more of my shit." Bucky rolls his eyes at Steve's immediate protest and ruffles his sleep and sex-rumpled hair. "Hey, none of that. 'Sides, what's done is done; I ain't giving you back now."

"I'm holding you to that." Steve cups his hand around the back of Bucky's head and pulls him over for a kiss.

His lips are soft, just a little chapped. Bucky's hand wanders from Steve's waist down to his ass, then reluctantly skims back up. "What do you say we get out of here?" Bucky murmurs.

"Hmm?" Steve says distractedly, then freezes, glancing at the mirrored glass. "Shit."

"Forgot where we were, huh?"

"Um." His voice is a little high. Bucky leans back to see that the blush goes all the way down his chest. Nice.

He can _look_ now if he wants.

 _Very_ nice.

His grin is goofy as he glances down at the shreds of their clothes on the floor. Steve follows his gaze and his blush goes incandescent, although a pleased smile tugs at his lips.

Bucky files that away for future reference.

"Suppose they'll just let us sneak out of medical without any more tests?" Steve asks with a sigh.

"Not a chance in hell." Bucky nuzzles the top of Steve's head, then slips off the bed. The bag is still in the corner, just where he left it. He tosses a teeshirt and sweatpants at a grateful Steve and pauses to watch that skin disappear under cloth before he pulls his own on.

Bucky strides back and cups Steve's jaw, leaning forward to press a gentle kiss against his lips. Steve leans forward chasing the kiss when Bucky pulls away, and Bucky can't resist. This kiss is less gentle, with more teeth and a few snickers as it turns into a competition.

Steve's eyes blink open and this time he's the one to pull away, sliding his hands down Bucky's arms and lacing their fingers together. "Let's get out of here."

Bucky squeezes Steve's hands and pulls him to the door.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Whole World is Watching by Within Temptation.
> 
> On Tumblr at [chaosandmemory](https://chaosandmemory.tumblr.com/).


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